1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of power management and more particularly to display management for multi-screen computing environments.
2. Description of the Related Art
Power management refers to the management of the consumption of power by a computing device. Power management can be performed with respect to an entire computing system, or with respect to individual components of a computing system. In this regard, components of a computing system ranging from the network interface card to the disk drive have been individually managed for optimal power consumption. Of note, while initially power management found purpose in prolonging battery life in portable computing devices, power management has found equal purpose in reducing power consumption in support of environmental conservation and in support of data privacy and security.
It is well known that display devices consume substantial power during operation. Thus, power management as applied to a display device generally involves the strategic reduction in display intensity responsive to a detected absence of interaction with a corresponding computer. After a prolonged absence of interaction, the display can be completely deactivated. In this way, the power otherwise consumed by the display can be conserved. To the extent that the absence of interaction is interpreted as the separation of an end user from the computer, the deactivation of the display can act as a privacy and security measure.
Recently, with the advancement of liquid crystal display (LCD) technology in flat panel displays that consume a small physical footprint, and the relative affordability of flat panel displays, end users have coupled multiple different displays to a single computer through a multi-display adapter. While each individual display can display an identical image of the same desktop, many opt to drive the display adapter to cause the display of the desktop computing environment across the aggregation of the multi-display environment. Consequently, in the latter circumstance, each display can show only a designated portion of the desktop computing environment.
Power management in respect to the multi-display environment differs little if any from the single display computing environment. In this regard, after a detected period of inactivity in the computer, the intensity of display of each display can be reduced accordingly. After detecting a prolonged absence of activity in the computer, all displays can be disabled. Notwithstanding, end users engage the multi-display environment differently than the single display environment. In this regard, in a multi-display environment, typically the end user focuses upon one display showing a portion of a desktop environment of interest, to the exclusion of other displays in the multi-display environment showing respectively different portions of the desktop environment. Thus, on many occasions, the excluded displays consume power needlessly.